suffice

From Middle English suffisen, from Middle French souffire, from Latin sufficiō (“supply, be adequate”), from sub (“under”) + faciō (“do, make”). Cognate with French suffire.

• (US, UK, Canada) IPA^(key): /səˈfaɪs/
• (UK) IPA^(key): /səˈfʌɪs/
• (Canada) IPA^(key): /ˈsʌ.fɪs/
• IPA^(key): (obsolete) /səˈfaɪz/^[1]

• Audio (US):

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• Audio (General Australian):

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• Rhymes: -aɪs, -ɪs

suffice (third-person singular simple present suffices, present participle sufficing, simple past and past participle sufficed)

1. (intransitive) To be enough or sufficient; to meet the need (of anything); to be adequate; to be good enough.

   For this plum cake, two eggs should suffice.

   • 1667, John Milton, “Book VII”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:

     To recount almighty works, / What words or tongue of seraph can suffice?

2. (transitive) To satisfy; to content; to be equal to the wants or demands of.

   A joint of lamb sufficed even his enormous appetite.

   • 1838, The Church of England quarterly review, page 203:

     Lord Brougham's salary would have sufficed more than ninety Prussian judges.

3. (archaic) To furnish; to supply adequately.

   During the festival, the temple suffices food to the beggars.

   The king sufficed his army with food and weapons before the great battle.

• Commonly used in the phrases suffice to say or suffice it to say.
• Mostly used in modal verb constructions, such as: Half a loaf per day will/should suffice. This is much more common than the direct form Half a loaf per day suffices.

• (be enough) work, do

• suffice it to say

• satisfice
• sufficient

• “suffice”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “suffice”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
• “suffice”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

• Cuffies, cuffies

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈsʊf.fɪ.kɛ]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈsuf.fi.t͡ʃe]

suffice

1. second-person singular present active imperative of sufficiō